


moody judy

by showyourbones



Series: golden [1]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, M/M, Mental Health Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-24
Updated: 2016-01-24
Packaged: 2018-05-16 01:33:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,025
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5808172
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/showyourbones/pseuds/showyourbones
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>bokuto can't juggle what's in his head or what's going on in his life but at least this thing with kuroo doesn't freak him out.</p>
            </blockquote>





	moody judy

**Author's Note:**

> i wrote this because i was thinking about bokuto's "moods" and what happens if you dig deeper into that. things that i struggle with came to mind. and of course, his relationship with kuroo. which is 100 emoji. not beta-ed and then i edited it and i was like i do not want to read any of this shit any fucking more.

Bokuto holds his new prescriptions in his hand on his phone and stares. He's wondering if it will come to life if he looks at it hard enough. He's staring so hard he almost drops his phone on the pavement when it starts vibrating, and he's been too distracted to buy any protection for it; one crack and it's _gone--_

He coughs, puts on his best smile and, "Yo!"

"Hey, boo," Kuroo's voice comes through the speakers. Without Bokuto's consent a corner of his mouth quirks up at the pet name. "Just wanted to know what happened to you last night? You kinda dipped."

"Yep," Bokuto pops the 'p' and picks at a piece of frayed cloth in the hole of his jeans. "Had an appointment this morning." A girl passes by and gives him a smile but he doesn’t register that he should have smiled back until she’s passed. “Shit,” he mutters.

"Bo? Good appointment or bad appointment?" Kuroo presses gently. Bokuto thinks distantly that he's trying his best not to pry but he is prying. Not that he minds, he wants him to pry but he's too ashamed to let him actually know what he was doing.

"Hey, I'm on my way back," Bokuto chirps. "I've got some coffee but let's do lunch. That's really girly right? I like it, let's do _brunch_ babes."

There's a pause on the other line, some rustling, and Kuroo finally speaks, "Yea, Bo. Ok." Kuroo's silently calling Bokuto on his shit but he won't say it out loud. It’s Bokuto’s move now.

"I'm good..." Bokuto hesitates, "I promise. See you soon, boo." Bokuto shuts his eyes, cringing at the pet name that sounds foreign in his mouth right now, and hangs up.

Bokuto kicks out his legs in wait. He left Kuroo in his bed this morning after his gig with his band to see the psychiatrist one of his friends from work recommended for him. What he ended up with was too many pill prescriptions and dodged questions that his self-proclaimed pea brain couldn’t handle.

Kuroo was probably confused when he woke up to his best friend not in his bed. Bokuto snorts. Their platonic relationship was about as not platonic as it could get at this point and yet it was the most uncomplicated thing in his life right now.

He likes to call this current lack of feeling a downswing. Like when his palms smacked the ball to hit the bottom of the court.

He gets on the bus.

\--

“I thought it would be just us,” Kuroo bites his lip apologetically. “But they couldn’t resist.” Kuroo glares at the table of intruders. Daichi, Tanaka, and Oikawa have the decency to look a bit contrite.

“I’m hungry,” Oikawa whines. “Iwaizumi wanted to go _running_ and I was like we were out drinking all night last night what is wrong with you honestly!”

“You know he’s a health goth,” Daichi chuckles. “Didn’t you say he was like this in college?”

“I thought that would change when we became drop-outs,” Oikawa grumbles and stuffs the sandwich he ordered in his mouth.

“This is so good,” Tanaka grunts through a mouthful of food.

“Don’t take off your shirt,” Daichi orders him.

“Where’s Akaashi?” Oikawa turns to Bokuto. ”And why are you so quiet. Kuroo keep you up?”

“Sleeping,” Bokuto replies. “He said--” Bokuto stops and squints. Sure, he hasn’t said much but it’s also been like _two minutes and--_ ”No, you fucking loser,” he laughs.

Everyone makes fun of them, he and Kuroo, because they’re not _together_ and when they’re with other people they actually make use of their respective apartments more than they usually would. They haven’t even really kissed, jesus. Being as close as they are and hanging off of each other doesn’t really help their case, he guesses. And Kuroo is undoubtedly it for Bokuto which is probably why anyone else doesn’t really work for him. It’s okay though because Kuroo is as uncomplicated for him as it gets.

“Kay,” Oikawa ruffles his hair but he’s looking at him funny. “Long as you’re alright.”

“Did you like last night?” Kuroo asks him.

“Who did the best?” Tanaka asks. “You can’t say Kuroo unless you _really_ mean it!”

Bokuto can only kind of remember what happened last night, he’s honestly surprised he woke up for his appointment. He knows he likes to drink a lot when he goes out. Sometimes it’s to have fun. Sometimes it’s to forget about his (perceived) problems. Alcohol could change his moods into one thing or another.

He was feeling terrible but he went to see his best friends and his friends play. The gig had an amazing turnout, the band was generating such amazing press, and they did so well. After, at their favorite bar, a couple or 8 shots later he forgot why his self-loathing was so deep and wanted to touch Kuroo. He knew that he and Kuroo were all over each other last night.  Luckily Kuroo wasn’t so far away that he couldn’t reach him. He grabbed for his hand and he got a blinding smile.

_“Hey, boo,”_ Kuroo had said to him, using the pet name they had adopted when they were in high school. He kissed him on the cheek riding the high of the gig. Daichi’s girlfriend Yui got on top of the bar, much to Daichi’s mortification, and ordered another round of shots. Hinata, one of the bartender’s, was  _delighted_ . When Hinata handed Bokuto and Kuroo a shot, Kuroo snatched them both and swallowed it down. He looked smug which was one of the looks Bokuto hated most on Kuroo’s dumb face when he was drunk. The alcohol made him feel warm and the ball of fire in his chest didn’t feel as strong as the warmth in his belly. He frowned and rubbed his face in Kuroo’s chest.

“You took my alcohol!” Bokuto accuses him, recounting the worst five seconds of thievery. “Tanaka wins.”

“Not by any actual merit but I’ll take it,” Tanaka puffs out his cheeks. “Thank you for this opportunity, Bokuto-san.” Kuroo slaps Tanaka’s hands from their prayer position.

“You didn’t even think about it!” Oikawa pouts. “I looked very attractive, my hair captured the light just so.”

“I saw you fall asleep at the bar like a baby,” Daichi snorts.

“Yui definitely tried to carry you on her back last night, man,” Tanaka interjects.

“Oh wow,” Kuroo smirks. “You’re all losers.”

Every head at the table minus Bokuto turns to look at him. Bokuto only hears Kuroo mumble an _I’m cool…_ because he’s looking at the notification on his phone telling him to pick up his pills. He quickly locks his phone when he feels Kuroo’s sneaker tap against his. When he looks up at Kuroo, he looks as concerned as he can without alarming Bokuto so Bokuto winks. It doesn’t do much to change the look on his face but Kuroo reaches over the table to take his hand.

Bokuto excuses himself to the bathroom when they’re paying because Kuroo _refuses_ to let him pay for his own meal (“you’re kind of broke right now, dude” to which he’d gotten a whole table full of woops from the peanut gallery about his younger sugar daddy.) Bokuto’s looking at himself in the mirror when Oikawa comes in the bathroom of the restaurant. “Hey man,” Bokuto tilts his chin. “You-” Bokuto tries to talk but quickly realizes he has nothing to say. He’s tired.

“We miss you coming around the apartment,” Oikawa says. He leans on one of the stall doors. Then he almost falls through the doors. Bokuto smirks. “Don’t say anything. Anyway, it’s been a while.”

“I’ll be back around,” he smiles with as much force as he can muster. “I’ve got a lot of balls in the air.” He smirks.

“You should go out there before they think you got lost in the restaurant,” Oikawa suggests. Bokuto laughs lightly and makes his way out but stops when Oikawa says, “Look, even I admit that in my infinite wisdom I don’t have all the answers but...we care about you. So. If you need anything. We do the best we can.”

\--

It’s been about a week and the pharmacy won’t stop calling Bokuto. This has prompted calls from both his psychiatrist and his therapist and he’s picked up approximately none of those calls. He hasn’t really left Kuroo’s apartment except to go to work; he hasn’t seen his friends and lord knows what excuse he’s given his teachers for school. His ankle must have twisted for the fifteenth time.

_kuroo told me to tell you to eat something, i know you’re not going to reply to this_

It’s the last message he has on his phone and he feels like shit for not replying to his best friend but Akaashi can wait. Bokuto’s on an important episode of Forensic Files. Bokuto hears the door of Kuroo’s apartment close and he groans. He wonders if he can pretend to be asleep to avoid talking. He turns the brightness of his laptop off and closes his eyes.

He hears Kuroo come into the bedroom and get himself situated. “I know you’re awake,” he hears him say. He feels him get on the bed just as his phone begins to ring and-- _shit._

Kuroo reaches for the phone. “It’s been ringing over and over, Bo. I don’t know why you haven’t fucking picked it up,” Kuroo sighs. “Hello?” Bokuto doesn’t think he’s ever seen someone’s face change so fast. “It’s your therapist,” he bites his lip. “Sorry. I’ll go.”

\--

 

“I-” Bokuto starts to say. But he can’t say fucking anything. The tears start before he has a chance to stop them.

“I’m not mad,” Kuroo says quietly. “You think I’m mad but I’m not. I have no right to be. But why wouldn’t you tell me what’s been going on?”

“I’m ashamed,” Bokuto grits out, tears coming out. He’s been down for weeks and felt so silent and hasn’t been able to speak and it feels like someone’s punched him in the fucking stomach and now he can’t stop-”It’s so _embarrassing_ Kuroo and to say it to the love of your life? Do you-”

“Can you come here?” Kuroo asks and he looks _wrecked_ , like he would beg some more for Bokuto to be nearer. Bokuto walks over to where Kuroo’s sitting and puts himself in his lap, buries his head in his neck and breathes. “I know it’s hard, Bo. Where do we start?”

 

\--

Bokuto Koutaro had a healthy sense of self--or so he was told. He was really good at volleyball but he could be better. That was a thing he was having trouble with. He was top 5; he could be top 3, he could be _number one_ but he was going to fix it. He had moods, like up and down at once, sometimes down for weeks at a time, sometimes up for a day or two where he wouldn’t sleep but felt like the trees outside were really green. He always had this feeling in his chest that felt like fucking fire quite often and it hurt. But he also had a team that he could uplift and that uplifted him.

He had a best friend, friends, and a great team.

Akaashi told him that the skateboard tricks that he and Kuroo tried to do to impress girls with were embarrassing but Bokuto didn’t like to listen. He had a life. He, Kuroo, Akaashi and all their dumb friends liked to fuck around and sometimes drink and get high and all their terrible attempts at faux-adulthood in between volleyball.

Kuroo and Bokuto got their first tattoos--matching--when they were 17, very well done stick and pokes on their inner forearm, and that was the day Bokuto fell in love. He could watch Kuroo blow in the smoke of his cigarette, his eyes downcast and think _never has a dude looked so fucking good_. That was the day they started calling each other boo. You held hands with your high school volleyball rival, you let them hug you from behind and allow them to lift your shirt to feel your skin.

When Bokuto wasn’t playing he was sometimes studying and when he wasn’t doing that he was with his friends. When he wasn’t doing that, he was wondering why he wasn’t good enough for anything, or why he felt so good one minute and so down the next. His heart rate seemed to slow down and speed up so quickly. Kuroo would tell him he got sad often but he was okay with that, Bokuto hated everything about not feeling normal so he would try to keep it inside. What if Kuroo decided he didn’t like the fact that it was worse than he let on and didn’t want to touch him anymore?

But Bokuto Koutaro was going to go professional with volleyball. Bokuto Koutaro, supposedly, had this healthy sense of self or, supposedly, an inflated ego. Which was great. But, Bokuto Koutaro, didn’t quite like himself enough. He graduated high school and he went to college, majoring in art and he was good at that; still playing volleyball although his confidence in his abilities dwindling by the second and he decided to take a break. He didn’t tell any of his friends that he had stopped and he might not go back to it.

Kuroo declined on the college bit and got in a band with some other friends and did very well for himself. Bokuto expected his raging jealousy to take over, especially for someone he adored because for someone people _said_ was so good--he wasn’t. But it never came. He accepted that cards would fall into place for Kuroo and his own life would stall. He was probably fucking up his life because he was potentially making up just a prolonged battle of melodrama and teenage angst. You wanted to die one day, you’re ok the day after. He had no reason for it, that’s just the way it was.

He didn’t want to fill 3 prescriptions because he didn’t believe in his bullshit but he didn’t want to get out of bed either. He’s gotten so bad at pretending.

\--

 

Bokuto focuses on Kuroo stroking his leg. “You’re not making this up,” Kuroo says.

“Hm.”

“Bo,” Kuroo sighs. “Come on, look at me. Please?” He maneuvers Bokuto’s face from his neck so they’re looking at each other. “You’re so supportive with other people. Why aren’t you giving yourself anything?”

“Why am I this way?” Bokuto replies. “I’ve thought about it. Nothing happened to me you know? There’s this obsessive record in my head playing like _you’re making it up you’re making it up you’re making it up_ and then I cut to these images of punching myself in the face for being so fucking stupid.” He can’t stop crying and it’s painful. “I just want to be the image of myself everyone has in their head.”

“You can’t be that, especially if that’s not you right now.” Kuroo palms his head. “I love any type of Koutaro.” Bokuto looks up at him with wide eyes at the use of his name. “Let me help you, please?”

“What if I vomit on your shoes when we get the prescriptions? i have anxiety you know,” he huffs. “Don’t call me Koutaro, it makes me weak.”

“That’s the idea.” Kuroo smirks.

“I’m very unhappy right now Kuroo,” Bokuto confesses. “I’m scared of what all of this means and what it means for us.”

“Nothing changes,” Kuroo replies immediately. “Ever. Why didn’t you tell me you took a hiatus from volleyball?”

“The one thing in my life I knew I was truly good at.” He bites his lip. “I barely admitted it to myself.”

“You’re good at a lot,” Kuroo reassures him. “We’re gonna figure it all out. I can help you, right?”

“Yea, boo, you can help.” Bokuto smiles a bit and it’s the first real smile he’s smiled in a while. “You’re going to have to give me a while. I’m sorry.”

\--

“Hey, Iwa-chan says-oh okay.” Bokuto hears Oikawa giggle in the doorway of his bedroom. He’s currently smiling into his kiss with Kuroo; they’re kissing deeply and Kuroo bites at Bokuto’s lower lip which  grants him a deep moan and he gasps when he pulls away because fucking _OIkawa._

“Why are you _staring_ , dude?” Bokuto throws a pillow at him.

“You definitely did not stop when I came in here,” Oikawa points out. “Our bedroom, really?”

“We came in here to find some stuff?” Bokuto waffles. “Right?” He looks at Kuroo for help but he’s still on top of Bokuto and he doesn’t seem to want to stop kissing him.

“ _We_ barely have sex on that bed you freaks,” Oikawa squeaks.

"We’re the complete opposite of you two, if you haven’t noticed,” Kuroo deadpans. He finally rolls off of Bokuto and attempts to fix his hair. He motions to his head asking if it’s okay and Bokuto shrugs.

 “Yea, true, like...we're good looking,” Oikawa supplies. Bokuto and Kuroo give him twin squints. “Ah, the wonder morons in all their glory.”

“What are you freaks doing in here?” Iwaizumi sighs. “Akaashi told me to make sure that Bokuto and Kuroo weren’t fucking on our bed. Everyone’s waiting, come on. The food’s going to get cold.”

“Yes, mom,” Oikawa smiles at him. Iwaizumi rolls his eyes but allows his hand to be taken anyway. He hears Oikawa trill _don’t fuck on our bed_ and Iwaizumi grunt his assent as they walk away.

“Hey, boo,” Kuroo says as he kneels in front of Bokuto on the bed. “How do you feel today?”

“Um.” He bites his lip. It’s been a couple of months and some days are better than others. He can’t say that he’s happy or unhappy but he’s getting there. This is one of the better--stable--weeks he’s had since he was probably 14 and that was over 8 years ago. “I’m alright.”

“Good.”

“I’ll be alright,” Bokuto promises.

**Author's Note:**

> this isn't all, i think i have more planned. i have so much fucking work to do and i have so much schoolwork. i should be writing a script, and planning another script, and cleaning my new apartment. but guess what i'm not doing.
> 
> friendship is important to me so all the other characters and their relationships will be featured more. i want to show their support. i also want to talk about their plans and what they have done bla bla bla. i literally listened to the new panic at the disco album the whole time i wrote this shit which is shocking to me.
> 
> if you have any questions about hcs/specifics abt his illness (or anything else in this ~universe~ lol u can get at me. i have a twitter (@hvmanracing, but mostly i talk about film school and feminism--sorry i'm not the best writer but i like getting these things off my chest. bye bye)


End file.
